Trans-Pacific View author Mercy Kuo regularly engages subject-matter experts, policy practitioners and strategic thinkers across the globe for their diverse insights into U.S. Asia policy. This conversation with Naoko Aoki — Stanton Nuclear Security Fellow at the Rand Corporation and formerly with Kyodo News, Japan's largest news agency — is the 174th in "The Trans-Pacific View Insight Series."
Explain Tokyo's strategic calculus in U.S.-North Korea negotiations.
Japan has two policy goals regarding North Korea. One is to solve the nuclear and missile threat North Korea poses to Japan and the other is to settle a bilateral dispute over Japanese nationals kidnapped by North Korean agents in the 1970s and 1980s. The second problem has a deeply emotional aspect in Japan, and Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has repeatedly called it a policy priority.